Post: #451

I finished a bootcamp a few weeks ago, if anyone has questions.

So far, its been the best decision I've made. Im going out on my own at first, but a lot of my classmates are getting jobs, though quite a few them were well ahead when they entered class(one had 2yr python, a couple girls with developer hubbys and 2 comp science majors) and frankly the tech market isn't all that good where i live.

The market for Javascript and Java in the us is on fire, if you have time to learn them and be good at them, youll easily get hired.

However, Javascript is a tough language and you'd be better off learning Ruby or Python at first and sticking to it. Due to simplicity, they'll likely not go away anytime soon and frankly there seem to be lots of jobs for them.

Age discrimation from what I've seen is only a problem at new start-ups, if you're working at a large corp, i don't think theyll care, at least thats the impression i get.

Great thread btw.

Post: #452

I also just finished a bootcamp. It was a lotta JavaScript + related frameworks and MVC backend shit, a bit of React. I'm taking a little time to strengthen my front-end skills now before trying to go hard at getting work.

Post: #453

Hey guys, thought I'd post an update on my current situation since my last post, which was some time back in December. I've been working as a front-end developer for a little under a month now and I'm loving it so far. I'm sure others have mentioned these before, but here are some tips that helped me land my job:

1. Buy Colt Steele's The Web Developer Bootcamp. It's $200, but Udemy has sales every month, so you can get it for super cheap (usually around $10-15). Colt's course teaches you HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and the MEN (MongoDB, Express, and Node. No Angular) stack. After finishing this course, you should have a solid grasp of front-end web development.

2. Do Team Treehouse. You don't have to, but I highly recommend it. Although Colt's course is excellent, he doesn't delve deep into topics. After finishing his course I still had a rudimentary grasp of JavaScript and I was overly reliant on jQuery to do even the most basic of things. I recommend doing Team Treehouse's Full Stack JavaScript and Learn React tracks.

3. *There's a course on Udemy called J Understanding the Weird Parts. I strongly, strongly recommend it. If you don't sign up for Team Treehouse, at least get this course. You'll get a deeper understanding of closures, callbacks, promises, unit testing and many other concepts that trip up even most experienced JavaScript programmers.

4. Do coding challenges on exercism.io and Codewars. Reading and watching videos is fine, but you need to actually practice in order to cement your knowledge. Do code challenges for about an hour everyday. They can be extremely hard but don't get discouraged. If you get stuck on a problem, don't look up the solution. Take a break and come back to it later.

5. Approach local businesses in your area that don't have a website and offer your services. I did this for the gym I go to free of charge. Now I don't have to pay for my gym membership.

6. I can't stress this enough, but you absolutely must attend meet ups. I went to an event on Node.js basics and I met my now-boss there (I got an interview the next day). Speak to everyone. Ask what they're working on, how long they've been coding, etc. Imply you're looking for a job, but don't make it too obvious.

7. **Create a Github account and upload whatever projects you're working on, no matter how trivial. I guarantee you if you don't have a Github account employers won't hesitate to toss your resume in the trash. Be discerning with what you put on there, obviously, but some is better than none. It at least shows you know how to use a version control repository.

8. Learn common algorithms. Get Grokking Algorithms and use that as your study guide. The algorithms are written in Python but if you know your way around your language of choice, it should be easy to convert the code. I'm not sure how common whiteboard tests are -- I wasn't given one -- but still brush up on your algorithms just in case.

* Or if you prefer books, John Resig's Secrets of the JavaScript Ninja is a good intermediate to advanced JavaScript book as well. Word of warning: it's riddled with typos, even some of the code samples. It's still a good book though.

** Alternatively, you can create a blog and share what you've learned by writing up tutorials on confusing aspects of your language of choice. Helping others solve their problems on Stackoverflow as frenchcorporation mentioned is also a big plus as well.

Feel free to ask me any questions.

Post: #454

Quit my job as a doctor last year and started learning coding. The beginning was real tough. I figured I could pick it up easily and be creating fancy apps in a month or two. Really glad to have persisted through the initial phase of HTML, css and jquery. When you get onto the juicier stuff like react it becomes much more fun

Post: #455

(05-11-2017 07:08 PM)riverfish Wrote:  Quit my job as a doctor last year and started learning coding. The beginning was real tough. I figured I could pick it up easily and be creating fancy apps in a month or two. Really glad to have persisted through the initial phase of HTML, css and jquery. When you get onto the juicier stuff like react it becomes much more fun

I'm curious, why did you quit your doctor job? And what country are you in?

Post: #456

(05-12-2017 09:48 AM)frenchcorporation Wrote:  

(05-11-2017 07:08 PM)riverfish Wrote:  Quit my job as a doctor last year and started learning coding. The beginning was real tough. I figured I could pick it up easily and be creating fancy apps in a month or two. Really glad to have persisted through the initial phase of HTML, css and jquery. When you get onto the juicier stuff like react it becomes much more fun

I'm curious, why did you quit your doctor job? And what country are you in?

I did my studies and worked for 4 years in london. To be honest, i wanted to quit since very early on in med school, cos i always felt that it wasn't for me, so it's a miracle that i lasted so long. Don't get me wrong - the job is satisfying and carries a lot of prestige, but it's also a huge commitment and not worth your time if you are anything less than 100% committed.

At the moment i got a digital nomad-type gig doing R&D for a health startup, which is perfect because the work only takes me a few hours day, leaving the rest of the time for me to learn coding and travel

Post: #457

^^Why not just work locums? I don't know your specialty nor how it works in the UK, but in the States you can make well over $40k a month even as a GP if you are willing to pick up random shifts in the middle of nowhere on short notice. You could literally work your ass off for a month and then take two months completely off to travel and still make a lot more money a year than whatever you can hope to make as a programmer working year round.

Post: #458

(05-12-2017 03:42 PM)Rice Brah Wrote:  ^^Why not just work locums? I don't know your specialty nor how it works in the UK, but in the States you can make well over $40k a month even as a GP if you are willing to pick up random shifts in the middle of nowhere on short notice. You could literally work your ass off for a month and then take two months completely off to travel and still make a lot more money a year than whatever you can hope to make as a programmer working year round.

Did that for a year and a half and the money was great - was raking in £8k a month, sometimes even £10k depending on how much i worked. But the work was utterly soul crushing. There were days where i'd rather call in sick (and not get paid) than go in, do 8-9 hours of work and collect a cool £400 cheque. For me, life is too short to be doing work that you don't love, even if you're getting good money for it.

Post: #459

Good news guys, I've landed myself a C# software developer interview next week. This is without experience or a degree.

I've just followed what frenchcorporation and jj90 have posted on here.

I'll let you guys know how it goes.

Post: #460

Hi all, I'm 46 and I'm writing from Italy.
I work as Java Enterprise software developer since many years (not Java 8) , but I'm pretty tired to work here. What could I do to change my situation? I'd like to work outside my country, but I've to improve my english knowledge and to catch up my technical skills.
In addition I'm concerned about my age, are there in other coutries possibilities for a such old developer? Maybe I should think to an exit plan from the rat race world, and it would be my best option, but this is not so easy to do...
TIA and excuse me for my bad english.

Post: #461

@ Lestatt

You could do freelance software development or set up your own business through your experience and contacts.

I had my phone interview, TBH, I did not prepare for it, they asked me if I researched the company, which I said I didn't, they asked me about what attracted me to this job, what my strengths are, weaknesses, SQL which I answered well to all of these questions and also what services I have developed(which I answered poorly).

I don't think I've got into the 2nd technical face to face interview.

I'm surprised they did not ask me about my projects.

Post: #462

Theirs plenty of programming, software, web projects that you can learn and use these projects from Team Treehouse, Pluralsight, Udacity, Lynda.

Post: #463

(05-11-2017 07:08 PM)riverfish Wrote:  Quit my job as a doctor last year and started learning coding. The beginning was real tough. I figured I could pick it up easily and be creating fancy apps in a month or two. Really glad to have persisted through the initial phase of HTML, css and jquery. When you get onto the juicier stuff like react it becomes much more fun

Do not get into web development. Get into data science. You can leverage your MD and coding skills (Python, Julia) into a very lucrative career.

Post: #464

(04-26-2017 12:28 AM)Swoldier Wrote:  Hey guys, thought I'd post an update on my current situation since my last post, which was some time back in December. I've been working as a front-end developer for a little under a month now and I'm loving it so far. I'm sure others have mentioned these before, but here are some tips that helped me land my job:

1. Buy Colt Steele's The Web Developer Bootcamp. It's $200, but Udemy has sales every month, so you can get it for super cheap (usually around $10-15). Colt's course teaches you HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and the MEN (MongoDB, Express, and Node. No Angular) stack. After finishing this course, you should have a solid grasp of front-end web development.

2. Do Team Treehouse. You don't have to, but I highly recommend it. Although Colt's course is excellent, he doesn't delve deep into topics. After finishing his course I still had a rudimentary grasp of JavaScript and I was overly reliant on jQuery to do even the most basic of things. I recommend doing Team Treehouse's Full Stack JavaScript and Learn React tracks.

3. *There's a course on Udemy called J Understanding the Weird Parts. I strongly, strongly recommend it. If you don't sign up for Team Treehouse, at least get this course. You'll get a deeper understanding of closures, callbacks, promises, unit testing and many other concepts that trip up even most experienced JavaScript programmers.

4. Do coding challenges on exercism.io and Codewars. Reading and watching videos is fine, but you need to actually practice in order to cement your knowledge. Do code challenges for about an hour everyday. They can be extremely hard but don't get discouraged. If you get stuck on a problem, don't look up the solution. Take a break and come back to it later.

5. Approach local businesses in your area that don't have a website and offer your services. I did this for the gym I go to free of charge. Now I don't have to pay for my gym membership.

6. I can't stress this enough, but you absolutely must attend meet ups. I went to an event on Node.js basics and I met my now-boss there (I got an interview the next day). Speak to everyone. Ask what they're working on, how long they've been coding, etc. Imply you're looking for a job, but don't make it too obvious.

7. **Create a Github account and upload whatever projects you're working on, no matter how trivial. I guarantee you if you don't have a Github account employers won't hesitate to toss your resume in the trash. Be discerning with what you put on there, obviously, but some is better than none. It at least shows you know how to use a version control repository.

8. Learn common algorithms. Get Grokking Algorithms and use that as your study guide. The algorithms are written in Python but if you know your way around your language of choice, it should be easy to convert the code. I'm not sure how common whiteboard tests are -- I wasn't given one -- but still brush up on your algorithms just in case.

* Or if you prefer books, John Resig's Secrets of the JavaScript Ninja is a good intermediate to advanced JavaScript book as well. Word of warning: it's riddled with typos, even some of the code samples. It's still a good book though.

** Alternatively, you can create a blog and share what you've learned by writing up tutorials on confusing aspects of your language of choice. Helping others solve their problems on Stackoverflow as frenchcorporation mentioned is also a big plus as well.

Feel free to ask me any questions.

Solid list. I got Colt's Udemy Course for $10, and have had a positive experience. It definitely gives you a good grasp of HTML, CSS and Java. I'm not finished with it yet.

The one thing that freezes me up sometimes when learning, is the amount of resources available and not being able to pick one and going with it. I've got like 5 tabs open and just juggle them, though this doesn't seem like a very efficient approach.

Post: #465

How common would you guys say remote junior developer jobs are? Or other jobs at a similar level? I am 30 with a good career earning right at 6 figures but I do not like being stuck in one place and contracts for my career are too inconsistent. I've saved and invested well so I am interested in more freedom.

I am looking at spending the next 2 years learning to code a few hours(10ish) a week while working my current job then going to a bootcamp with my GI Bill at the end of the 2 years.

The only concern is being able to find enough remote jobs paying at least 30k, preferably 40-50k. Are these typically 40 hour a week jobs or will they require significant amounts of overtime?

Post: #466

Quite easy if you have the skills and a decent portfolio. I'd get started with a bootcamp if I were you while they're hot, I personally think their value is diminishing as they solely focus on front end dev.

Remote jobs:
http://www.angel.co/jobs
http://www.remoteok.io
http://www.remote.jobs

Post: #467

(06-19-2017 10:00 AM)Jaydublin Wrote:  How common would you guys say remote junior developer jobs are? Or other jobs at a similar level? I am 30 with a good career earning right at 6 figures but I do not like being stuck in one place and contracts for my career are too inconsistent. I've saved and invested well so I am interested in more freedom.

I am looking at spending the next 2 years learning to code a few hours(10ish) a week while working my current job then going to a bootcamp with my GI Bill at the end of the 2 years.

The only concern is being able to find enough remote jobs paying at least 30k, preferably 40-50k. Are these typically 40 hour a week jobs or will they require significant amounts of overtime?

It's not easy to land a remote job straight out of a bootcamp. It can be done, but it's not easy, the usual route is to land an onsite job for a year or two and then go remote if you want.

Post: #468

Contributing on open source projects in your chosen languages is another great way to boost & make your CV/Resume more attractive.

Yeah if you've got the skills and a good portfolio, theirs no reason why you can't land a programmer, developer job.

Post: #469

Thanks for the info guys. So it sounds like a remote job is not too hard to land as long as one is decent with a couple years of experience under his belt. What would you guys say the pay is for this level? Well say decent talent but 1-2 years experience? Do remote jobs typically require a normal 40 hr work week or is it just based on my speed of completing tasks?

What forums are good on this sort of information?

Post: #470

(06-22-2017 09:29 AM)Jaydublin Wrote:  Thanks for the info guys. So it sounds like a remote job is not too hard to land as long as one is decent with a couple years of experience under his belt. What would you guys say the pay is for this level? Well say decent talent but 1-2 years experience? Do remote jobs typically require a normal 40 hr work week or is it just based on my speed of completing tasks?

What forums are good on this sort of information?

I doubt your Gi bill can even be used for a boot camp. If you put in 10 hours a week, for the next 2 years, you won't even need a boot camp.

I'm assuming you want to track web development. Study CSS first (you will get HtML experience with that). It will be a boring 2 weeks, as CSS/HTML is primarily static content and isn't much fun by itself,

After 2 weeks start studying JavaScript. Vanilla JavaScript, that means just raw barebones regular JavaScript without any libraries like jQuery. As this is your first "real" programming language it will take some time to get the fundamentals of programming down.

When you can code a browsed based game using HTML/CSS/JavaScript your are ready for the next step. Your game should be primarily text based, but use buttons to allow user interaction. Think in terms like the old classic dope wars (you travel around selling drugs) or some simple dragon-knight game where you click buttons to attack, defend, or run away from the dragon. The important think is you can manipulate stored data and the DOM (dom is essentially the contents of the web page) through JavaScript and user initiated events.

Then spend a couple weeks focusing on the more advanced ES6 JavaScript stuff, namely promises, callbacks, and the array methods.

Then you should start learning a JavaScript web framework such as Angular2 (now it's Angular4) or ReactJs. It will be a large jump in experience level so be prepared for it to be difficult. The bonus is these frameworks are all built on JavaScript, so your not picking up a brand new language.

Finally after that you can learn backend JavaScript services (NodeJS). Again this will be another large jump in difficulty, so be prepared. And again it is based in JavaScript so you're not too far out of your comfort zone.

That is enough to be a full stack web developer focused in the trendy JavaScript stack. At a consistent 10 hours a week focusing on the above flow of study you should be a beginner level in a year. You absolutely could start freelance at this point. In two years you'll be in the beginner intermediate level, you should be able to land a job at this point.

A boot camp will be a waste of your time at that point. Take your GI bill and go to school in some area you will enjoy. Either stay in the US or use it to pay for an international school. If you have a full 4 years of Gi bill, Get a degree in CS (90% of the classes will be a breeze for you at that point).

Enjoy the GI bill helping you with living expenses while you build your own apps

Post: #471

While Atomic's plan will work, it depends on what a person wants. If it's learn to code and be a freelancer in x years sure, It won't work if you are career transitioning and need to be employed in 1 year.

Post: #472

Got a cushy job doing data science and machine learning for a capital markets firm in the Baltics, probably a good spot to build up my network to eventually start a crypto fund.

(06-21-2017 10:39 PM)Spaniard88 Wrote:  It's not easy to land a remote job straight out of a bootcamp. It can be done, but it's not easy, the usual route is to land an onsite job for a year or two and then go remote if you want.

Most bootcamps have corporate partners, I think the Flatiron School guarantees employment upon finishing the bootcamp.

Post: #473

Develop 5/6 solid projects in your chosen languages, this could be a video game, command line game, mobile apps, project/content management system software, rest api's, web apps.

For Java, developing android apps since they're Java centric will get you through the door.

If you're struggling for projects, you can use team treeehouse, pluralsight, Lynda, udacity projects as your own projects.

Also their are Javascript, node, angular, react, vue, express, jquery projects in web developer magazines titled 'web developer'.

Learn and be competent in JavaScript, web technologies, test driven development, object orientated programming, SQL, no-SQL, aws, Linux. These skills are very important to employers and you will use them.

Also learn coding challenges, in interviews, you may be asked to make a website, also presented with coding challenges, asked technical questions. I've got to complete a programming challenge myself.

On my CV/Resume, after my profile/summary, I've put in bullets a list of my skills, then personal projects explaining what technologies I've used, in brief how I implemented the project and previous work experience, education in one line each.

Post: #474

I'm trying to setup a Python environment where I teach myself code from anywhere remotely (Switching off between Work and Personal Laptop) preferably via browser. My job is pretty demanding so this option would be nice.

I'm not entirely sure if I'm able to connect via AWS Remote Desktop EC2 from my work laptop. Anybody know a platform where I can code and compile thru a cloud platform but via browser? or if I can do that from AWS Free tier somehow?

Post: #475

(07-18-2017 03:57 AM)expectation Wrote:  I'm trying to setup a Python environment where I teach myself code from anywhere remotely (Switching off between Work and Personal Laptop) preferably via browser. My job is pretty demanding so this option would be nice.

I'm not entirely sure if I'm able to connect via AWS Remote Desktop EC2 from my work laptop. Anybody know a platform where I can code and compile thru a cloud platform but via browser? or if I can do that from AWS Free tier somehow?

What you are referring to is known as Infrastructure as a Service.

Check out C9.io. It's free (they do require a credit card but don't charge it) and super easy to setup any type of environment you want. All browser based.

Of course there are many others, Python anywhere is a pretty decent one too. I hear lots of people talk about HeroKu but I've never used it.

If you want a virtual private server. Go with digital ocean for ease of use (one click installs). I've found Amazon EC2 to be more of a headache than it's worth for small projects/learning.